Ken Levine has released new details about Irrational’s plans for Bioshock Vita.

Speaking in a series of Twitter pots yesterday, Levine revealed that the planned Vita game would likely depart from the series’ first-person shooter roots and take it in a new direction grounded in turn-based strategy.

“I was thinking a Final Fantasy Tactics style thing set in pre-fall Rapture,” he said in a Tweet. “Something that would work well on the Vita and not be a compromise in any way.”

Speaking about the game’s failure to become anything more than an idea, he placed the blame in the camps of 2K and Sony. “2K and Sony couldn’t put a deal together,” he said. “They seemed way more optimistic about this back in 2011.” He would go on to say that he’d still love to do it himself, “but lawyers and all that.”

Levine’s comments would seem to confirm that Bioshock Vita is, in fact, as dead as most fans have likely presumed it to be. This, of course, is something that 2K itself has declined to comment on, even in the wake of Irrational Games announcing that it would dissolve following its work on Bioshock: Infinite.

Strauss Zelnick, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc., is the head of ZelnickMedia, an investor in both Take-Two and Defy Media, LLC, our parent company. This article was published without approval or consent of ZelnickMedia or Take-Two.

The art dealership Cook & Becker have teamed up with Irrational Games to sell artwork based on the studio’s latest title, BioShock Infinite.

The New York Times has referred to BioShock Infinite as “a literary endeavor for the multimedia age”, and they certainly aren’t kidding. Not unlike the original BioShock, Infinite is a rare breed of game, and one that sets itself apart from all of the rest (or at least the rest of the triple-A titles in the industry) by offering a setting that’s well within the borders of the fantastic, outside of the norm—including any Tolkien-’inspired’ settings that exude mediocrity.

Cook & Becker describe the game as “a mainstream work of art crafted by a huge team of very talented people but still carrying the clear signature of an auteur. In this case that of creative director Ken Levine.”

The dealership goes on to state that Levine’s broad interests in things like American history, pop culture and recent events like the ‘Occupy’ movement have shaped BioShock Infinite. Like his interests, the game explores themes of historic revisionism, racism, politics, and religion in a ways both brave and interesting.

The creativity of BioShock Infinite is without bounds, and it comes as no surprise that in addition to its own creative setting, the game has managed to inspire artists to create expressions of their own—many of which we chronicled in a previous feature, wherein we showcase the artistic expressions of artists, craftmakers, and cosplayers.

In spite of the fact that the freedom offered by the game is marred somewhat by the lack of tools to allow players to freeze time or enable free-look, screenshot photographers like jim2point0 have been able to create high quality screenshots—on par even with the ones sold by Cook & Becker.

These hand-numbered limited edition prints (or giclée) are made from super high-resolution in-game renders, each of which is signed by series creator Ken Levine, the game’s artist, and master painter. Each print costs $250 to $550, and that’s just for the unframed ones. If you want them framed up, you’ll have to pay even more for the process, which involves dibonding with liquid gloss. The framed artwork can cost upwards of $1,500.

Be sure to click through this flickr gallery of images for their full resolution versions, which are big enough to serve as wallpapers for your desktop. Here’s everything they have to offer.

Cook & Becker isn’t new to video games, as the dealership previously offered artwork and prints of other games including the Mass Effect series, Mirror’s Edge, and Killzone. If you think you can afford the price tag, just head over to the BioShock Infinite section on their website to make your purchase.

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/super-expensive-bioshock-infinite-artwork-signed-by-creators/feed/1Ken Levine: Violence is an Essential Part of Storytellinghttp://www.gamefront.com/ken-levine-on-bioshock-infinite-violence-is-essential-to-narrative/
http://www.gamefront.com/ken-levine-on-bioshock-infinite-violence-is-essential-to-narrative/#commentsWed, 03 Apr 2013 19:59:36 +0000Ian Miles Cheonghttp://www.gamefront.com/?p=215657Violence is a part of the storyteller's toolkit, says Ken Levine.

There’s no denying that BioShock Infinite is a violent game, but whether the violence is an essential part of the game’s narrative is a matter of debate.

Irrational Games’ Ken Levine argues that violence within the narrative has always been a part of the “story teller’s toolkit” no matter the medium, and that games are no different. Levine points out that using violence as a narrative device is nothing new.

“Violence, for better or for worse, is…going back to the dawn of narrative,” Levine said in an interview with NPR’s Tom Ashbrook. “I think there’s a couple questions here. I remember when I was a kid; I was not a very popular kid. I was a nerdy, little kid. And I didn’t have friends because I wasn’t very good at socializing, and I found Dungeons & Dragons.

“If you remember, back in the 70s there was this big human cry about Dungeons and Dragons; kids were going off and killing themselves and disappearing into caves. And that happened with comic books and that happened with rock and roll music.”

The show’s host Tom Ashbrook trotted out the case of the Sandy Hook shooting, saying that the loss of life was immediate, suggesting that violence in games had a possible role to play in the massacre. Levine responded to this, saying that for him, games were a way to get away from the violence of the real world.

“My point is, for me personally, games were a way around being ‘that kid.’ I’m not speaking as a scientist here; we can argue the science, but I’m… not the best guy to do that,” Levine said.

“I think the other point is they call them first-person shooters; F-P-S. There’s the F-P, the first-person aspect of being, inhabiting a character’s role, and then there’s the S part, which is the shooter part. And I’m not sure that they’re necessarily one in the same.”